


What We Are, and How We Came to Be

by callingCujo



Series: Yuri!!! in Overwatch [1]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game), Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Alternate Universe - Overwatch, Kidnapping, Multi, SPOILER ALERT ONLY VIKTUURI WILL BE IN THE FIC, War, i post about this on instagram a lot, is just yuri on ice characters as overwatch characters honestly, theres fighting obvi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-05
Updated: 2017-07-25
Packaged: 2018-11-23 14:26:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11404305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/callingCujo/pseuds/callingCujo
Summary: Everybody has a story.





	1. MikKen

**Author's Note:**

> okay, wow. this is my first fic that's more than 2,000 words. so. wow. pls judge me.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kenjirou sometimes wishes he hadn't agreed to fight.

**_Minami Kenjirou was five when he played his first game. His parents always tell him they remember the way his eyes lit up when he finished a level, and how he begged to play just a little more before going home. It was what probably started all of this, the only reason his life turned out the way it did._ **

 It’s cold outside today, Kenjirou notices, as he steps outside, swinging his small bag of coins back and forth. It’s not unusual for it to be cold around this time of year, but he appreciates the weather anyway- he prefers the cold, because when it’s hot there are always people trying to escape the heat, and the arcade gets so crowded. When it’s crowded, he doesn’t get to play any games.

 Of course, some would argue that he plays enough games anyway. He has all of the high scores on every machine at the arcade, and the smaller kids always complain that they can’t beat him. Sometimes one of them will challenge him, and he can’t help but let them win, just to see how excited they look. Everyone adores him, of course, especially the smaller kids. He’s basically- no, he _is_ a celebrity, having appeared in various movies and TV shows, as well as being the top gamer in the world. He’s probably the reason their small little town gets so much attention.

 He doesn’t mind being famous. Other people hate it, say that every detail of their life is spilled to the press, but Kenjirou is an open book anyway. No secrets, of course, that’s all it has ever been with him. His parents didn’t raise him to keep things from people. Besides, there’s nothing he does that needs to be kept secret anyway. No drama in his life, no scandals- only games and movies.

 Even in this era- the true era of technology, people sometimes say- he’s unusually devoted to the internet. He’s not so sure why people think that’s such a bad thing. Video games are so fun, and connecting with people through them is so easy. Much better than meeting people in real life. He wonders if it’s because he already knows they have something in common when they meet through video games.

 Kenjirou decides that’s enough thinking for today. He’s been walking for several minutes, and he’s approaching his beloved arcade. He has a competition later today, but that doesn’t mean he can’t beat his own high scores in the arcade for a few hours. Besides, it helps him calm down, because it’s almost like a safe space for him- he can ignore the pressure of the world and the stress of being who he is while he’s inside.

 He pushes the door open gently, and the woman who runs the place smiles at him. She doesn’t talk to him anymore, but he’s not complaining, They both know he would rather run off to play some games. Speaking of games, he’s already headed over to one- Fighters of the Storm. He knows this is a very old game, but he loves it because his mom used to talk about playing it, and how happy she was that she recognized one of the games in the arcade. He runs a hand gently over the buttons on the game, then opens his bag and inserts a coin.

 He’s presented with the familiar start-up screen, and that is enough to get him to grin. He moves the joystick so the ‘Single Player’ option is highlighted, and then uses one of the buttons to select it. The character select screen pops up, and he picks his favorite character. The flying one, in the mech, is the hardest character to win with, and that’s why she’s his favorite. The game starts with a cutscene, a few pieces of dialogue from both of the characters, before the screen shows a more 2D scene. Words flash on the screen, telling him the game is starting, and suddenly he’d expertly moving the joystick and tapping the buttons until he’s won the battle, and put himself among the top five players once again (all of which are him).

 He’s just finished typing in his online name, MikKen, when he notices someone enter that is dressed way too formally for a casual day at the arcade. He tries to get a better look- the man isn’t Japanese, but he’s definitely asian. _Korean,_ he thinks, as the man turns to face him.

 At first he figures the man is gawking at him because he’s a celebrity, but he doesn’t appear to be gawking, just staring. And his eyes look so blank. Kenjirou doesn’t think he’s ever met anyone with such a scary stare. It brings shivers down his spine, which only get worse when the man walks over to him.

 “Minami Kenjirou?” he asks, and Kenjirou can barely find it in himself to nod. The man doesn’t waste any time in speaking again. “I have a job offer for you.”

 Kenjirou tilts his head lightly. This person doesn’t look like he’s an agent of any sort, or a casting director, so he’s confused. “What kind of job?” he questions, and the man looks as if he’s debating with himself internally before he finally does respond.

 “A job in a special unit of the army. I work for the Mobile Exo-force of the Korean Army, and I’m here to recruit you.” Kenjirou thinks this is much too top-secret to be shared in an arcade, but when he looks around, he notices that nobody is there anymore. Not even the lady at the front desk. He wonders why he didn’t notice them leave. “We’re looking to recruit gamers to fight the Omnics with personalized mech suits, designed to fit only the person who uses them.”

 Of course, Kenjirou has been hooked since mech suits were mentioned, and he’s been grinning. “I’ll join!” he exclaims almost immediately, his eyes almost sparkling as he imagines it. It’s almost like his favorite character in FotS, he realizes, and that causes him to grin more. “Uh- When do I start? _Where_ do I start? Do I need some kind of special training?”

 He doesn’t know it yet, but this is the beginning of the hardest part of his life.

  ** _Minami Kenjirou was only 16 when he flew a mech suit into battle for the first time. He remembers the horror of battle vividly, and always reminds himself that he has to do this so there can be things like video games and celebrities for all of the young people who look up to him._**

 Kenjirou has gotten special permission to livestream his battles after he realized that talking about it as if he was in a game made it easier for him to fight. It’s only his third time in battle, but he’s used simulators almost every day. Most people in the force with him are Korean, and well past their twenties, making Kenjirou the youngest member. He doesn’t know for sure, but he’s heard people talking about how he may be the best.

 The large plane carrying everyone in their suits shakes as it lands. A few people who have never been in it before look terrified, although Kenjirou is almost certain that he isn’t one to talk. The large door opens slowly in front of him, and he thinks to himself that it almost looks like a cutscene from some game.

 Already, he can hear fighting. A few older soldiers take off in their mech suits, and Kenjirou presses a labelled button on the control panel. “MikKen online,” he speaks, and he sees the number of views in the bottom right corner of his screen skyrocket up very quickly. He flies out into the battle, commenting on how civilized this place looks for an Omnic-only city.

 There isn’t much time to look around. There never is, because this is real life. One of the many reasons he prefers games to reality is that games always give you time to look around, and they always show you secrets. But here, there’s only the sound of metal against metal, the soft, quiet gunfire of the mech suits and the rapid, noisy, and erratic fire of the Omnics.

 “Boosters engaged,” he says quietly, boosting towards a group of Omnics that aren’t facing him. He plows through them so easily, and he lets out an excited whoops, shooting at another one and watching as it explodes. It’s so easy to pretend that this is another simulator, he realizes. Losing sight of reality is so easy when he’s in his mech. He’s very thankful for that.

 A Bastion starts to shoot at him, and he turns his mech so he’s facing it, then puts up his defense matrix and flies towards it, blowing it into pieces easily. In the distance, he hears someone blow up their mech, but he doesn’t worry about it. The blast is made to only hurt others, seeing as both the mechs and everyone’s suits have protection against it. The bright neon disintegrates a huge amount of Omnics, so much that the fight from then on is easy. Only a couple of enemies- _Omnics,_ he reminds himself, _this isn’t a game_ \- have managed to take him by surprise.

 Kenjirou is amazed by how much the mech force can do in thirty minutes. In thirty minutes, they’ve eliminated every Omnic that was attacking. He’s just ended his stream and flown back into the plane when he sees that one person in particular was badly injured. One of the first-timers, he thinks, and he ejects from his mech to run over. All of them were trained in basic support, but this looked much more serious.

 He can see blood on the outside of her suit, and he can see that the suit was ripped open in many different places. It frightens Kenjirou that the Omnics could get through the suits when they were supposed to be more than bulletproof. They were evolving, certainly, because nobody had gotten injured at all in the last battle. Kenjirou’s hands were shaking.

 The girl who had been hurt is crying. He recognizes her, because he’d played against her once, before joining the mech force. He registers that a few more people start to crowd around her, before they’re all pushed away by the medical specialist.

 He’s in the front of the crowd, so he can clearly see her wounds being disinfected, can clearly hear the medic mumbling about how there’s not enough time to get her into the tiny med lab before bandaging her up. He doesn’t see any bandages, though, and something crosses his mind that he hadn’t thought of before. The woman is going to die here.

 Kenjirou doesn’t know when the tears started flowing- or why, because he barely knows this girl. He knows he’d going to start to sob, and he puts a hand over his mouth, feeling himself shake lightly. The medic is telling her she’s going to be okay, she’s going to live, she just needs to keep her eyes open. He’s overwhelmed, because he has never witnessed someone’s death before.

 The woman tells the medic to come closer, and it appears as if she’s whispering something, before the hand what was gripping said medic’s arm slowly fell limp. Kenjirou hears a scream, and he doesn’t even realize it’s his until he’s pulled into a hug by someone he doesn’t even know. Without asking who they are or why they decided to comfort him, he hugs them back, sobbing into the taller person’s chest.

 This is the first time he doesn’t compare life to a video game. This is something that can’t be compared to virtual reality. This is also the first time he truly sees how much danger he’s put himself in by joining this force, but he can’t back down now, he refuses to. He has to keep everybody safe. He has to keep his family safe.

 The taller man lets go of him, but he doesn’t register it at all. He doesn’t register anything clearly right now, perhaps because he’s sobbing or because his mind is overflowing with thoughts, sadness, fear.

 He hears the commander announce that there will be no funeral held, and his head snaps up in anger. He hears that where will be no memorial for the girl, because this is war and people aren’t always remembered. This makes him furious.

 “She was fighting for you! Do you even care? She died trying to protect her country! She deserves to be remembered, it’s not fair! What about her family??” The jumble of words is spilling from his lips before he can stop himself, and for the first time he does not step down when faced with the commander’s glare.

 “There will be no memorial,” he repeats, and Kenjirou knows he’s lost. _It’s not fair,_ he keeps telling himself. _It’s not fair._

  ** _Minami Kenjirou was 17 years old and more experienced with war than most people on the planet when he received a digital message from his father. It was the first one he had gotten since leaving to join the MEKA force._**

 He’s sitting in his bed, playing a game on the holo-tablet he’s been provided with when he gets the message. At first he doesn’t think anything of it, although he’s a little bit happy, although he decides that he can wait until after he finishes this level to read it.

 The level only takes him ten minutes to finish. Most people have gone to sleep by now, but Kenjirou needs to open this message. He wants to see how his family is doing.

 He exits out of the game and clicks on the message, dimming the lighting so it won’t wake up the other people in the room.

  _Kenjirou,_

  _I’m sorry I haven’t been able to talk to you, but we’ve been busy trying to support ourselves on our own, and I haven’t had any time to write. I keep hearing that there are more fatalities every day, but they never mention who. I pray each night that you won’t be one of them. I watch every single one of your livestreams. I’m very proud of you, Kenji._

 Kenjirou smiled at the nickname. His whole family calls him that, and they always have.

  _Unfortunately, I’m writing with some bad news. I don’t know if they’ll tell you if I don’t send it to you myself. It’s hard for me to type this, and I imagine it will be harder for you to read it. Your mother was visiting a family member in Korea- your aunt, do you remember her? She’s the one who bought you your own gaming setup when you were only 10. On her visit, the airport happened to be attacked by Talon, the terrorist group, which I’m sure you’ve heard of._

 He’s holding his breath. He has to cover his mouth because he’s afraid if he doesn’t then he’ll scream. His mom can’t be dead, right? He hopes she’s only injured, not dead. He hopes that’s what this is leading up to.

  _She tried to defend those poor kids.. Kenji, she’s gone. Your mother was killed by a sniper, there was nothing anyone could do. I haven’t left the house in days, but there’s going to be a funeral. I don’t know if they’ll let you come, but please try, for me, and for your mother. Please._

 He’s very much aware that he’s crying, and he bites down hard on his lip so he won’t cry loud enough to wake people up. He doesn’t bother to read the rest of the letter. Instead, he drops the tablet on his pillow and slips out of bed, grabbing his keycard from his bedside table and using it to exit the room as quietly as possible. Once he’s out, he navigates the hallways to find the commander’s office. He sees a green light by the door- the commander is in there and not in a conference. Kenjirou presses the button to notify him that there’s someone there who needs to speak to him.

 The door slides open almost a full minute later- he’d been counting. The commander looks tired and angry, but Kenjirou isn’t fazed. The commander opens his mouth to speak, but Kenjirou gets there first, blurting out, “I need to go home to see my family.” He takes a breath, and then keeps explaining. “My, um, my mom just- she just died, and, and I need to be there for the funeral-”

 “No.” His eyes widen in shock, he was so sure he’d be allowed to go. “We can’t afford to have you gone for even a day.”

 Kenjirou understands that he’s their best fighter, and he understands that the Omnics are getting harder to kill, but he’s young and selfish and he needs to go see his family. “Please! Please, this isn’t fair!” he shouts, and the commander is unaffected, like always. He’s kicked out of the room, but that doesn’t stop him from repeatedly banging on the door, kicking it, anything that will make him open up again.

 He does that for a solid 30 minutes before storming off again, but not back to the rooms. He goes to the simulator, swiping his keycard and then running to the nearest simulator. He starts it up, setting the difficulty to the highest it will go. He’s never tried that before, and none of the battles have been intense enough that he needs to.

 He spends an hour in the simulator before it forces itself to shut off, telling him he needs to go to sleep. He’s to angry to sleep, he thinks, but he walks slowly back to the room anyways, stalling for as long as he can. He reaches the room and suddenly there is no more loud crying, and he enters quietly.

 Kenjirou can hear everyone breathing quietly, some snoring, and he realizes that he may not be the only one that’s been told they couldn’t go home. He looks back on it and knows he was being selfish, knows that he wouldn’t be told he could go home if everyone else in the room was told no. Still, he had dared to hope. Maybe that was the reason he kept being so enthusiastic about fighting.

 He crawls into his bed, and curls up into a tight ball under the covers. Tears are still flowing freely, and he wipes his eyes with the comforter. He shouldn’t think about this. He shouldn’t think about his mother anymore. Commander always tells everyone that if they have a past, it’s best not to remember it too much. He might start to follow that advice, because he knows for sure that it will help him.

 That was the day he decided to forget a lot of things.

  ** _Minami Kenjirou was still 17 when he got to go back to the real world again, instead of being trapped in the large, yet empty bunker._**

Kenjirou had almost forgotten that most of the world wasn’t war-torn. Of course, he isn’t back home, but Hollywood is good enough for him, seeing as he’d been there several times before. Not to mention, he loves the way everyone there recognizes him as an icon. It makes him feel like he’s still 15 and the top gamer in the world.

 He was currently sat in a coffee shop, laughing at something that someone two tables over had said. He had honestly forgotten how much joy the little things in life brought him, like sitting alone in crowded shops, or just being worry free in general. Some song was playing on the radio, very quietly, and Kenjirou guessed it was from the two years he’d been gone.

 He liked it a lot, actually.

He hadn’t had much access to music in the bunker, and the music he did have access to was only very old Korean songs. Not that he disliked them, of course, but listening to the same songs for two years nearly drove him mad. Sometimes he thought it had driven him mad.

 He glances over at the counter nearby, observing the probably underpaid and overworked employees. He used to think that was one of the worst jobs someone could have, but he thinks it’s much better than his current occupation. Even so, he wouldn’t trade places with any of those workers. He knows who and what he fights for. He’s fighting to people can still enjoy their lives, so people can have fun without worrying about an Omnic attack. He’s fighting so that maybe he can be like the heroes in Overwatch, who he’d been doing a lot of reading about while stuck in the bunker. And, most importantly, he’s fighting so that the younger generation will have someone strong to look up to. He wants to be strong for everybody.

 Not like the world will know this, though. He always keeps up a facade whenever he streams, one that makes him act just like any old gamer would when playing a video game. Analytical, sometimes, but mostly over the top and showy. It’s what the people want to see, so that’s what he gives them.

 Someone is talking about the omnic war, and Kenjirou can just barely hear them. Some mention of the fighting that’s going on, and how that’s worse than whatever job they have, ‘so really you have no right to complain, Joseph’.

 Some part of Kenjirou wants to laugh at that. He’d been one of those people, the kind who complained while knowing others had it worse, but he couldn’t really say that was a bad thing. Complaining wasn’t a bad thing unless people made it a bad thing. Kenjirou never complained anymore.

 His thoughts continued in this way for a while, until the partner he’d gone to Hollywood with walked in and let him know that it was time for them to go. He sighed lightly, and left his drink on the table.

 He missed this.

  ** _It was on Minami Kenjirou’s birthday, August 18, that he received an encrypted message from someone with no name._ **

 This was where the message had said to go. It had only contained coordinates, and an extremely detailed plan to get out of the bunker unnoticed. So, naturally, Kenjirou had followed them here, to what looked like a wasteland.

 Waiting there for him was a friendly looking man in a rather elaborate outfit, with what looked to be a holographic blue device strapped to his chest. “Hi, Minami!” the stranger said, rather cheerfully, and Kenjirou tilted his head in confusion. “So I guess you figured out my message. I’m here to recruit you!”

 That reminded Kenjirou of the last time he’d heard those words. He’d been so young and so unaware of what he was signing up for. He distrusted this other person almost instantly. He couldn’t believe he’d snuck here in his mech to get recruited for something that was probably worse than his situation now. Still, though, he stayed to listen, just because he was curious.

 “The Governments really don’t handle Omnic invasions well,” the stranger seemed to be talking to himself, but he continued, and Kenjirou realized that this was still directed at him, “so we want you to join us to stop that and more. But you can’t tell anyone.” He must still look confused, because the stranger continued, “We’re reforming Overwatch. We need you.”

 Overwatch. He wanted to be a hero, didn’t he? He wasn’t as young, as wild, as foolish as he was when he accepted the call to be a mecha pilot, but he still knew what he wanted. “Okay,” he said, rather quietly, and the stranger’s smile seemed to brighten.

 “Brilliant!” he cried, then seemed to teleport forward, startling Kenjirou. “Follow me!”

 Kenjirou followed him, using the boosters on his mech every few seconds. He was tired, as it was the middle of the night, but he’d have to stay awake for this. He was more excited than he’d ever been in his life, yet also more terrified.

 It took hours to get to their destination, though Kenjirou expected that. He was just glad to be out of his mech once they arrived. There was even a designated space for him to keep his mech- how had they known he’d say yes? Well, almost everyone would say yes, but still. They’d even supplied him with regular clothes, which were nice. A bit old fashioned, but nice nonetheless. And comfortable.

 Nobody showed him around. An AI told him where his room was and told him that he should get some sleep. And he did.

 If being recruited for MEKA was the start of his new life, then this was the start of a new him.


	2. Widowmaker

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seung-gil sometimes recalls that he used to feel alive all the time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow. ok. sucky update. i hate writing seung-gil but i love seung-gil.

_ “When I was young, I had a fear of spiders..” _

 

Seung-gil huffed lightly as he tried to rid his apartment of the foul, eight-legged creature. Focused on only this task, he didn’t notice his boyfriend’s presence in the room, or the smirk that was on his face until he practically toppled onto him while trying to get away from the dreadful thing.

Hearing laughter, Seung looked up at his lover and frowned. “It’s not funny!” he protested, squinting as his lover just laughed more.Okay, so he supposed it might have been a little funny, but still. “Kill it for me?” he requested, a light smile on his face as he did his best to look helpless. “After all, a poor and helpless man such as myself couldn’t possibly get rid of it.” 

His boyfriend rolled his eyes lightly, grabbing a broom and hitting the spider. “There. Happy?”

Seung nodded, a grin on his face. “Very.” He never could kill spiders, as he was too afraid to go anywhere near them. Sometimes, he liked to joke that he only kept his boyfriend around to get rid of spiders. That was half the reason, of course, but he wouldn’t say that. Obviously, he really did love his boyfriend. More than anything, except perhaps his dog. Miso came before any lover. 

In the back of his mind, Seung-gil thinks that this is perfect, this is the life that he wants to keep having. He pays no mind to the war that’s starting to overtake England just as it has overtaken his previous home in Korea, because Overwatch is around and there’s really nothing to worry about when they have such capable people protecting them. But then, of course, his boyfriend’s communicator has to go off and change the atmosphere from negative to positive. The man read the text on the screen that had popped up and he grimaced. 

“Seung-gil, I have to go.” Seung can hear the sadness in his voice because of course he doesn’t want to leave, who’d want to leave just to fight in a war? “I’ll be back as soon as I can. I love you.” 

All Seung-gil can do is smile and nod, because he is kind of useless in this situation. He knows by now that no comfort he has to offer will help his lover in the slightest bit, not when he’s being called for a mission. He keeps his eyes on his boyfriend as said man walks through the door, not looking back at him.

Some part of him thinks it’s silly to be sad. And it is. Because there’s no reason his boyfriend won’t come back, but there still is a train of thought that leads him to realize that on one of these missions, Beaumont might not survive.

 

Later that night is when the intruders come. Seung-gil was never afraid of being left alone because he never considered the possibility that as an Overwatch member’s boyfriend, he’d probably be targeted by terrorist groups. This intruder came in through his window and grabbed him, startling him awake, though he felt something pulling him into unconsciousness again. 

 

He wakes up and he’s not sure what time it is, or where he is. It’s not dark in this room, which he notes carefully. If this was a normal kidnapping, this would be dark. But there people obviously plan on talking to him. Questioning him. They want to lull him into a false sense of security. 

The next thing he notes is that he’s strapped to a chair. The straps are loose enough that he couldn’t feel them at first, but they’re tight enough that he can’t get out of them after struggling. They’re around his hands and feet and they look like they’re built into the metal chair. For some reason, he’s not afraid, and that’s what really worries him.

He isn’t sure how long he sits there before a woman walks into the room. She looks less than friendly, but he assumed his kidnappers wouldn’t look all that nice. Still, what startles him is that she’s dressed very nicely. Definitely not a regular kidnapper.

She says nothing, but she’s writing things down and glancing up at him. It almost looks like she’s drawing. He wonders what she could be doing, but curses his own curiosity. He’s never going to ask, so he shouldn’t bother wondering.

The woman stays for thirty minutes. Seung-gil prefers loneliness to her piercing gaze.

 

_ “..I was told they felt no emotion, that their hearts never beat..” _

 

Seung-gil does not remember what they do to him, most of the time. He does not remember the way they torture him, but he does remember that he is being tortured. And he remembers slowly becoming numb to the pain. He is not sure that he is the same person as the man who was brought into this place. He is not sure he wants to be. Feeling nothing is better than feeling terrible things, as he has come to accept.

They have let him out of his chair, out of his room, many times by now. They have taught him how to shoot a gun, how to get away, and they finally have taught him not to hesitate before he pulls the trigger. He does not remember feeling more alive than when he killed a living person for the first time. He does not remember feeling alive at all before then. 

Beaumont comes to rescue him. He had forgotten about Beaumont and the outside world, about Overwatch. He is smothered in hugs and he is told that he’s been missed, and he holds back a sneer. People notice that he’s acting weird, but they chalk it up to him being traumatized. If only they knew what had really happened to him. The real reason he refused to talk to anyone.

He’s brought back to the Overwatch headquarters in London and he is allowed to roam as he pleases as long as he does not leave the base. He wonders how this organization is run by people who are so very stupid. He wonders why he was dating someone so very stupid.

He shares a room with Beaumont, because of said man’s request to have a shared room, and he plans what he is going to do next while he is left alone. When nobody is watching, he uses the base’s practice range to shoot the bots, over and over and over again. He doesn’t miss once, even though the sniper rifles here are terrible.

 

It takes a few weeks before Seung-gil gets in contact with Talon. And they get in contact with him first. They tell him to shoot Beaumont. And although he has killed a few people, killing Beaumont makes him uneasy.

Still, he sneaks a gun into their room. He waits for Beaumont to sleep, and then he gets up. He shoots his boyfriend twice in the head, and then he runs. He runs out of the base and into the streets of London, where he is picked up by Talon’s commander. He is taken back home to the base and he is celebrated, because he killed one of the most important Overwatch agents ever.

And he has also come back with information. As a reward, his superiors took him to the room he’d arrived in. He was promptly put out, but when he woke, he could tell something was different. His heartbeat was much slower. He was colder. And blue. If he cared about looks, he might have cringed. But this was more efficient than looking good, and now he knew he would never go back to the Overwatch group.

 

_ “..but I know the truth..” _

 

Seung-gil walked slowly over the rooftops of King’s Row, careful not to let himself be seen until he was close enough to take out the guard he’d been stalking for the past few minutes. It never was hard to take out ordinary people.

Overwatch wasn’t there to stop him from doing this, so he’d resolved to get it done quickly. It only took one shot to kill the most peaceful being in the world. A rush of emotion filled him, and he smiled coldly as he heard a familiar voice behind him, screaming at him, asking why he’d do something like this.

He didn’t answer.

 

_ “At the moment of the kill, they are never more alive.” _


	3. Tracer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Planes are a big deal to Phichit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was rushed and its totally bullshit, but its also my finest example of changing character stories a lot

Phichit Chulanont had always been fascinated by planes (he is still fascinated by them even after what just happened, that’s causing him to see his whole life flash before his eyes), although not in the ways that most kids should be. Most kids were fascinated by how fast and how high they could fly, despite being so heavy and carrying so many people. Phichit had never been an ordinary kid. 

A 13-year old Phichit sits in his room and pushes his long bangs out of the way. Phichit recalls having a terrible fear of getting his hair cut, so for the longest time his bangs fell over his eyes. The child version of him from this memory is looking over a model airplane and taking it apart, studying all of the mechanisms inside carefully. He knows that this model airplane doesn’t work, as the parts are made of plastic and there is no power, but he remembers that at this specific time he had wanted to build planes. He wishes that dream had lasted instead of the dream that made him want to be a pilot.

In this memory, his mother knocks gently and then opens the door, carrying a bowl that appears to be steaming. 13-year-old him gets excited about it, and abandons the model airplane on the desk, in a pile of blueprints. There’s a conversation going on, but he can’t make it out. All of the sounds in this memory are fuzzy, and the image is fuzzy too, with the people in it flickering in and out of existence occasionally. He could try and remember what had been said here, but it’s really no use, so instead he stares at his mother. He wonders how the present-day version of her is going to react once news gets out that his plane malfunctioned and he’s never in any one time for very long.

He misses his mother. He definitely, absolutely misses her. It’s been almost three months since he’s talked to her, or at least he thinks it has been. It’s harder to tell how much time has passed when you’re in another time period every five minutes. 

Phichit fixes his gaze on this younger, happier version of himself. He doesn’t remember this day all that well, if the fuzziness of everything around him is anything to judge, but he does remember what it was like to be thirteen. At that time, he’d thought he had so many problems, because he tended to talk too much (he still does talk too much) and he gossipped every chance he got. He’d had one friend, but he doesn’t remember their name. Doesn’t remember if that was real or not. It’s getting harder to tell what in his life was real, and he wonders if this is a side effect of whatever happened to him. He hopes it’s not.

He blinks, and the memory is gone. He is in a room, and there is a window in front of him. He knows this room, because this is the only place he’s been taken to more than once. He walks towards the window where there are two Overwatch agents observing him, and as loud as he can manage to, he asks, “How long since I got here?” 

That question is only essential because sometimes he’ll flicker back in much earlier than he did last time, or much, much later. Sometimes it’s close to two months. Never exactly there, though, and never past that. 

The nervous looking one, a girl who looks to be in her early twenties, answers in a shaky tone. “20 minutes.” Phichit is surprised by that. That might mean this was the first time he flickered back in, looking from an outside perspective. 

He looks at the clock on the wall. It is 8:30.

The next two leaps in time are not memories. One jump leads Phichit back to what he thinks is 2016, to an ice skating rink, where he catches the eye of someone who looks as if he is very bored with everything. He recalls seeing a face like that somewhere, except not so bored. He doesn’t remember who it belonged to. He doesn’t get to stay long enough to figure it out. 

Phichit isn’t taken to the room as a mid-point this time. He jumps to what he thinks must be the future, because there is fire everywhere, and it is unbearably hot. He sees a group of people up ahead, and he wants to ask what this is, so he tries to. He walks towards the group and he walks until he’s walked right through them. Right, nobody can see him unless he’s in the room.

It’s only after he’s brought back to the room by his ‘condition’ that he stops to wonder how he caught the eye of someone who shouldn’t have been able to see him. A part of him says that it doesn’t matter, that he could have been looking anywhere, but usually Phichit can tell when people are looking through him, because their eyes seem more distant. But, no. He had locked eyes with this stranger for a solid thirty seconds, not a reasonable amount of time to stare at anyone. Unless, of course, they had seemingly been brought out of thin air.

Shivers run down his spine. Phichit wonders what would happen if he was sent to his own past outside of his memories. Would he see himself? Initially, he thinks, probably not, because he is certain he would remember seeing himself, but then he remembers an article he read once. An article saying that if you met an exact clone of yourself, you probably would not recognize it as you. 

So, he thinks, he would definitely not recognize an older version of himself. His mind spins with the realization that any pedestrian he passed on the street could have been him. He could have looked directly at himself and not known until much, much later. His first reaction to that is to laugh, which startles the young boy who appears to be the only person looking over him. Phichit almost laughs again. They boy looks about fifteen or sixteen, but he’s using such high tech equipment. Still, if he’s been entrusted with all that, Phichit trusts him.

“Oi, you better not be going fucking crazy in there,” spits the boy, and this time Phichit does laugh again. He’s so vulgar for a kid, but he supposes most kids learn to curse pretty early on these days.

“I’m not. Just thought of something funny.” He gives the biggest smile he can manage, which also happens to be the fakest one. Its function is not to reassure the boy, but to reassure himself.

 

Phichit is pleasantly surprised by the next memory he is taken to. This memory takes place on his first day in Overwatch- he was still so young, only 17 at the time, still had high hopes for the future. By this time he knew how to fly planes even though he wasn’t technically allowed to, but he’d aced so many simulators that they’d let him try out a few actual flights. He remembers being overjoyed when he stepped into the cockpit of a real plane for the first time. He’s still overjoyed every time he steps into the cockpit of any plane. He remembers being overjoyed before the malfunction of the time-slip plane, or whatever it had been called.

That’s not what he’s trying to focus on right now, though. He’s trying to focus on the idea that he shouldn’t be able to visit his memories through time warps, and he’s definitely not dreaming. So, are these projections that his mind is putting up to keep him stable? Possibly. But he wants to entertain the possibility that he’s being forced to go to these places in his mind, too, because it could very well be happening. The ‘chronal disassociation’ could be messing with his head. New Theory- the disorder is messing with his head and his mind is showing him memories so he is able to keep a steady hold on his personality, on his feelings, and on his place in time. That would make the most sense, considering his visits to the room are always longer after he’s been in his memories. 

Memories, right. He supposes he should pay attention to this one, and so he does. There’s nothing all that interesting about it now that he really thinks about it. That day was just full of conferences and introductions, and he hardly remembers who he was intoduced to, so the names and faces are all fuzzy. Go figure. 

This memory fades abnormally quickly, and somehow leaving it is different than it usually is. It feels almost like he’s being jerked out.

To Phichit’s surprise (not) he ends up in the room. But there’s something different. He’s not feeling weak or ghostly as usual, and he assumes that’s because of a blue device that’s been placed in the middle of the room. He stares at it. The boy from one of his earlier visits to the room is present. “Oi, fuckface. A bunch of scientists made that things for you. They’re calling it a Chronal Accelerator, or whatever. It’s supposed to keep you anchored here, or some bullshit.”

For what feels like the first time in forever, Phichit grins for real. He picks up the device, noting the straps, and slips it on.

 

It’s been a few years since then. Phichit hasn’t aged a day, although he suspects that’s because of his disorder. Things fell apart. Overwatch is one of said things, which isn’t good for him, seeing as outside of Overwatch he doesn’t have anything to do, anywhere to live. But that’s fine. He doesn’t ever get hungry, though he’s pleased to find he can still eat, and it’s almost like he only needs minimal sleep. So, he’s completely fine with his situation.

And then Overwatch gets recalled. He’s ecstatic, of course, because after being fixed with his accelerator he’d made many new friends, most of whom he missed very much, but also because he gets to help again. Helping people was something he’d discovered he really liked to do, because he wanted to be recognized by people and because just seeing the smiles on everyone’s faces when they were saved by him was worth it.

But of course he had to be intercepted on his way to the Gibraltar HQ. And of course he was intercepted by Talon. 

The fight didn’t last long, though, but he hadn’t won. He’d escaped, but he hardly saw that as winning the fight. No matter, though. Overwatch first, then fighting Talon. He’d gotten much better at fighting since he’d last been in Overwatch, so he was prepared to shock his friends. He’s make a new, better impression on the world.


End file.
